[DCM]
Tilter at Windmills
|
So last week my friend Jamie and I got in a Battle for Salvation practice game. I'm still tweaking my list, and he sadly can't make it, but here's what we brought. I proxied a bit as I really wanted to test out a few more daemon units that I’m still getting put together. Just picked up the last of them last night for painting this week.
Nemesis- Fallen Angels
Lash Prince – 155 (warlord)
Lash Prince - 155
10 CSM w/Lascannon, Plasmagun, IoCG – 195
10 CSM w/2 Plasmaguns, IoCG – 190
5 CSM w/ Flamer = 80
2 Oblits – 150
2 Oblits - 150
8 Havocs w/4 Missile Launchers , IoCG = 210
Allies:
Slaanesh Herald w/Pavane, Hit & Run, Transfixing Gaze – 90
18 Daemonettes – 252
5 Horrors = 85
6 Flamers of Tzeentch = 138
6 Screamers of Tzeentch = 150
2000
Jamie fielded:
Inquisitor in Terminator Armor with Psycannon, L1 psyker (warlord)
Coteaz
5 Terminators, 1 hammer, 1 psycannon, 2 halberds
10 Strikes, 2x psycannon, hammer on justicar, psybolts
8 Henchmen- 5x deathcults with sword & axe, 3x warriors with storm shield & axe
2x psyflemen dreads
Stormraven w/AC, MM, Hurricane Bolters
Aegis with quad gun
Rune Priest with Jaws, Lightning
10 Grey Hunters w/2x plasma
6 Long Fangs w/5x ML
2x LS Typhoon w/TML & Heavy Bolters
We rolled Vanguard deployment and The Relic, and agreed to re-roll the mission. We got Big Guns Never Tire again (like last week), but went with it. In this one I had 8 scoring units and Jamie had 7, or 8 if he combat-squadded. We did strict-book Warlord traits, and he got countercharge in his own DZ, and I got army-wide Stealth & Move Through Cover, in Ruins only.
We were on the desert table, with a large multi-layer mesa/hill in the center, tall multi-layer hills in SW and NW corners of the board and a tall multi-layer hill in the mid-center of the East edge of the board. Tall impassible rocky spires dotted the landscape, some of them attached to low rises just under an inch tall, which gave cover. There was a small ruin (~5”x 8” rectangle with slightly raised areas but no true second floor) in the NW quarter, and a slightly larger ruin with an actual second floor in the SE. I got choice of DZ and took the SW triangle. Objectives were in the NW and SE ruins, one center-table on top of the hill, one SE behind a low (~.75”) rise and tall impassible spire, and the fifth out in the open in the West, between the SW and NW ones, but only ~6” from the table edge, where the other two were more central in their respective quadrants.
We rolled for Night Fight and turn 1 would be daylight.
Jamie got first turn/deploy, placing his Aegis along the front of his DZ starting from the NW end of his DZ line. From my left-right, NW to SE along his DZ line, he deployed half the strike squad with both psycannons, his grey hunters & RP with the quad gun, one dread, his terminators with inquisitor, and the other five strikes with Coteaz. His other dread was split off a bit further SE behind a rock spire, and his Long Fangs even further East, near the top of the big hill on the East edge of the board. His Speeders were hidden behind a tall impassible rock toward the SE part of his DZ. Stormraven with henchies in Reserve.
I deployed a bit back from my DZ front- NW to SE: 2 Oblits, 10 man CSM with lascannon using a low rise for cover, two more oblits hiding behind a rock spire, both princes using rock spires to hide from just about everything, 10 CSM with double plasma, with a few models hidden behind rocks but otherwise in plain sight of the Long Fangs and East dread. My Havocs were toward the top of the tall hill in the table’s SW corner. 5 CSM were in reserve to walk on, and the daemons of course would be doing their thing.
Turn 1: Jamie got Warp Quake with Coteaz’ Strikes but failed with the other. Thanks to the LOS-blocking hill in the center, and his long range units mostly not being close to or in sight of his HQs, he had no really good Prescience targets. His stuff advanced a bit, he killed a few of the guys in my right-side CSM unit, and focused a dread, two strike psycannons (I deployed a half inch too close- should have measured), the long fangs’ quad gun and Living Lightning, and the left Dread on my NW Oblits, trying for First Blood. Thankfully I didn’t fail the important 2+ saves against the Dread, and only took 3W, losing one Oblit.
My 1: I picked my Screamers and Flamers to be my preferred wave, with the Daemonettes (with herald attached) & Horrors to arrive later. I got the preferred wave, with my Flamers dropping safely on my side of the center hill (and running up close to it to be closer to the HQ-led units but completely hidden, and my Screamers dropping at the bottom of the East hill with the long fangs on it. My wounded oblit retreated South. My East CSMs advanced to get both plasma just in range of Jamie’s East Dread. My two East Oblits also lined up shots on that Dread, albeit at 36”+ range. My non-Warlord Prince Swooped just 12” or so North toward the Grey Hunters, to Lash them for a plasmacannon shot and maybe an assault next turn. My Warlord Prince Swooped East around the middle hill, getting into range of the Long Fangs. In shooting my Non-WL prince was countered by the Rune Weapon (dumb of me to get into 24” of the Rune Priest, since he wasn’t the closest model). The West Oblit still dropped a plasmacannon shot on the Quad gun and a few SW, but only killed one. My Lascannon from my CSM squad over there wounded the Quad gun but it was saved. My Havocs Krak’d the NW Strike squad and killed two. They passed Morale. Plasma guns bounced off the East Dread, but Oblit Lascannns exploded it for First Blood. My Screamers turbo-boosted over the LF to the very top of that hill, dealing 15 (!) hits with their 6d3, but only five wounds on a 4+, of which Jamie saved all of them. Argh. My Prince Lashed the Long Fangs a bit further down the hill where they wouldn’t have sightlines as clear, and bunched them together for plasmacannon love next turn if Jamie chose to stand them still for shooting. They passed Pinning.
Turn 2: Jamie got his SR, and it flew in from the NW corner, angling for my non-Warlord prince. His Speeders stayed back though, and aimed at my Screamers. His stuff generally advanced a bit, including (tantalizingly), his Inquisitor’s squad coming forward from behind the Aegis line. They were now within a long shot of my Flamers, and if I got a lash of even a few inches on them, I’d be able to get them far enough forward and bunch them nicely for maximized hits. His Long Fangs walked back up the hill to go after my Screamers. In shooting his speeders & LF killed half the Screamers. His SR rolled great against my Prince- hit & wounded with the MM, got two Rends from the AC, and another wound from the Hurricanes (outside 12”). I rolled and failed three. I then failed my Grounded test, Jamie didn’t roll a 1 to wound, and I failed the fourth save to lose the prince. Damn. His other guns on the left flank finished off my West Oblit and did a wound or two to my West CSM squad. In assault his LF went into my Screamers, who with their six S5 AP2 attacks killed one LF before dying themselves. Double damn. Those guys were more than capable of rolling that flank by themselves, and they did almost nothing. The LF consolidated back down the hill a bit to a good firing position.
My 2: My 5 man CSM squad arrived, walking up to the edge of the Ruin to the SE (then Ran fully into it and onto the objective there), but neither of my Daemon units showed. My Warlord continued Swooping NE, getting LOS to the Terminator squad. My remaining Oblits continued East, setting up a nice clear shot on the Long Fangs. My East (double plasma) CSM squad continued moving NE behind/around the center hill. My flamers jumped 12” forward right up on top of the center hill, positioning to JUST hit the terminators with no lash, or fry the heck of them with it, and to be a long distance charge from Coteaz’ Strike squad. My Havocs managed to get a hit on the Stormraven, Jamie didn’t Evade, and I got a Glance. Plasmacannons killed just two LF, leaving three. Lash on the Terminators worked, though, and got past DtW, and I rolled 11” and had all the placement freedom in the world. When I placed my Breath of Chaos flamer templates I got 34 hits and 17 wounds. Jamie managed more than the needed eight failed 5+ Invulnerable saves, so his Terminators and Warlord were dead. Okay, there’s some progress.
Turn 3: Jamie’s Stormraven continued on a SE trajectory, this time aiming at my intact squad of Oblits. His NW Dread moved to get an angle on my Warlord Prince. His NW Strikes continued advancing toward the objective in the NW quadrant ruin. Coteaz and Strikes rolled a nice 5” or 6” difficult move up the hill toward the Flamers, getting the front five guys within around 4”. His Speeders aimed at my Warlord. His LF stayed put. His Dread got a hit on my Prince, which I saved, but AGAIN I failed my first grounded test, suffering a wound from the fall. The speeders then hit and wounded with all four Kraks plus some heavy bolters, and my second prince was toast. Damn. The Strikes in the NW put a few shots onto my Lascannon CSM but didn’t do much. The Grey Hunters with Aegis and Lightning, plus the Stormraven, focused on my remaining two Oblits, did a pile of wounds and killed them both. His Long Fangs Fragged my CSM in the SE quadrant ruin, but I made my saves. Coteaz’ Strike squad, with Preferred Enemy: Daemons, killed half my Flamers in shooting, but were still only around 5” away, and they made their charge (Wall of Death just killed two). In assault they killed one flamer and wounded another. My flamers killed maybe one Strike.
My turn 3: Okay, that was a painful turn. Reinforcements? Horrors yes, 300+pts of Daemonettes + Herald, no. Ugh. Okay, Horrors dropped onto the hill with the Long Fangs, scattering uphill East but just staying on the board. Double-plasma CSMs started moving up the center hill from the SE side, to help out the Flamers, but rolled double 1s for Difficult. Argh. 4 or 5 would have gotten them into pretty reliable charge range. 1” was no good. Lascannon CSMs in the West started moving NW around their low rise, keeping cover, positioning to force the Henchmen to need Difficult rolls if they assaulted, and staying within 3” of the objective so as to keep using the half charge ranges benefit. Little CSM squad in the SE ruin moved + ran up onto the second floor in a spot where all models were within 3” of the objective. Now, the better move might have been to stay at ground level where fewer things would be able to draw LOS to them, but my thought here was that I was running low on units already, and I didn’t mind if they drew some fire. They could spend the rest of the game GtG for 2+ cover, even on the second floor of the Ruin thanks to the +1 for my Warlord trait. My Havocs stayed put. Shooting: Between the CSM Las and Plas, and Havoc MLs in the SW, I managed one more Glance on the SR. One hull point left. Horrors shot 15 times at the Long Fangs and killed 1. Plasma CSM squad Ran up the hill a bit. In assault Jamie rolled a bit poorly with his guys against my Flamers, especially Coteaz, and I was left with two wounded Flamers, which managed not much for their part; maybe one wound on Coteaz.
Turn 4: Jamie’s small, 3 man Strike squad with double psycannon in the NW rolled a 9 and failed to cast Warp Quake; they still headed into the small Ruin in the NW quadrant, followed by the Grey Hunters, which were a bit spread out and 5 or 6 inches behind them, not actually reaching the Ruins yet. They also straggled to keep a guy in contact with the quad gun. Coteaz’ buddies did get off Warp Quake on the center hill, but were stuck in HtH. Jamie moved his SR 18” toward the SW corner, aiming at my Havocs and getting inside 12”. He obviously elected to hold the henchmen inside for another turn; as with a 6” move the assault on my Lascannon CSM would have been iffy. His Long Fangs stayed put, and his Speeders moved a little and aimed at my Horrors. His Dread in the NW continued moving a little bit East toward the top center of the board, and got LOS on my small CSM squad in the SE ruin. In shooting the Long Fangs and Dread killed two more CSM despite 2+ GtG. The Speeders wiped out the Horrors. The GH and Strikes in the NW put a couple of casualties on the Lascannon CSM in the West/SW, but they were still doing pretty well, around 7-8 models. The Stormraven killed half of the eight Havocs, but they passed morale. In assault Jamie finished off the Flamers and Consolidated so that Coteaz was closer, but the Strikes were conga-lined over the objective and onto the opposite (North) slope of the hill, where it turned out they could hide models on the next level down from the top, while still having a guy within 3” of the center objective. Not great for me.
My 4: Okay, with Jamie missing Warp Quake, I had a nice big safe drop zone in the West for my automatically-arriving Daemonettes, right on the objective in the open space between the low rise & an impassible spire the Lascannon CSM had been maneuvering around in the SW, and the Ruin in the NW. The Daemonettes dropped fairly close to the ruin, rolled a 6” to Run and spread out, but with the closest models within 8-9” of Jamie’s Strike squad in the NW. My Lascannon CSMs now had the Deathcults breathing right down their necks, so they abandoned the objective (which the SR was almost sitting on), and continued snaking North around the low, difficult Rise, to at least force the henchmen to take the test when they inevitably assaulted next turn. My Plasma team didn’t have a lot of good options, and elected to retreat back down the hill a little, and focus fire on Coteaz, who had suffered a wound in the fight with the Flamers. If I could slip one Plasma wound past his 2+ Look Out Sir, he’d be dead and I’d be in better shape to take on the three remaining Strikes in the middle for control of the center objective on the hill. In shooting my remaining havocs and Las/Plas tried one more time on the SR. It had just one hull point left, and if I could get it the henchmen should suffer some significant casualties. I missed. Sigh. The central/SE CSM shooting just managed one casualty on the Strikes and I lost a plasmagunner. Argh.
Turn 5: Jamie dropped off his henchmen in the SW and they moved a couple of inches from my Lascannon CSM squad. His SR Hovered 6” backwards and kept on target on the Havocs. His Strikes moved up further in the Ruin toward my Daemonettes, but thanks to a low Difficult roll my girls would have cover from the edge of the ruin. The GH also moved up behind and were all going to have shots, with a few within 12”, but again my closest girls would mostly have cover from the Ruins. His Speeders drifted South to put even more shots on my two remaining CSM in the SE, in the ruin, on an objective. His Dread and Long Fangs also aimed there. Coteaz split off South from his squad to take my middle CSM on by himself over the top of the middle hill, while the two remaining Strikes hid North, in the lee of the top of the hill, within 3” of the middle objective. Shooting saw my two guys in the SE die, my havocs die, and 5-6 of my Daemonettes die. A RULES ERROR was committed here. I had missed the FAQ on the Daemonettes’ Aura, and thought they still counted as having Offensive and Defensive Grenades, so would get +1 to cover saves from enemy shooting within 8”. Sadly GW took that away from them in the FAQs. Anyway, they lost some girls but were still hanging tough. In assault Coteaz safely made it down the hill into my CSM without any plasma Overwatch hits, rolled well to kill three, IIRC, and they broke and were run down. His henchmen needed difficult but were only a couple of inches away and rolled three sixes for distance. Despite me picking up four or five hits with the Overwatch shots, I just killed one Warrior. In assault I again had a pile of attacks, going first because the henchies had no grenades, but despite 6-7 wounds, I only killed the two remaining Warriors. The Deathcults then annihilated my guys, and consolidated onto the objective.
Bottom of 5: Okay, Jamie has the NW, SW and center objectives, and no one’s got the SE anymore, and my Daemonettes have the West edge one, but can’t just sit there on it. With the loss of my middle and SE squads I’m out of the game, but let’s see what the girls can do. They go up to the edge of the Ruin, assault in, wipe the Strikes, Consolidate into the Ruin and now will have 3+ cover thanks to my Warlord trait.
We rolled a turn six and he assaulted the Grey Hunters in for fun; my girls ate a few casualties in shooting but still managed to inflict several on the GH in HtH thanks to piles of I6 Rending attacks, and hold on through the next assault phase as well. In the final accounting I didn’t get tabled, but Jamie handily had the win.
Observations:
There were several places I felt like my stuff underperformed its expected capabilities (especially the Screamers), but overall I kept this one pretty tight until ~turn 4, despite multiple important units being killed every turn. I feel pretty good about the list and its durability despite it all. 75 models with 96 wounds is nice, and the up-powered post-WD Flamers and Screamers are pretty amazing. I wasn’t 100% about shooting at the Stormraven turn after turn; it’s fairly low odds, but the payoff is big if I do manage to down it. If ~half the henchmen die, my CSM in the SW have pretty decent odds of finishing them off, between rapidfiring bolters and forcing the survivors to assault into me through Difficult, so at I1.
I did make some genuine mistakes, like pushing my non-Warlord DP too aggressively forward on turn 2. Jamie had more shooting than I did, especially at range, and I should have used the terrain better, as it broke up LOS pretty well.
Not getting the Defensive Grenade cover bonus on Daemonettes sucks. That would have been a nice little perk for them. Sad that GW didn’t let them have that. I think it would have made fine sense fluff-wise, with the Aura.
My current plan for BFS is to swap the Horrors for Bloodletters, and the fragile Slaanesh herald for a tougher Khorne herald, who can hold his own in a challenge better and even take on small squads by himself.
|
7K Points of Black Legion and Daemons 
5K Points of Grey Knights and Red Hunters 
